The Hacksaw needs an obvious nerf

Discussion in 'MAX' started by Sogui, Nov 27, 2012.

  1. Doogle

    with the reduced dash and increased ammo certs I can deff see a hacksaw max the max to be, not sure if its OP yet will have to see if counters start popping up as they become more popular.

    my only worry is that a max buff is in the works and it may push these lords of the biolab/techplant over the edge.
  2. Deschain

    This "nerf Max marathon really piss's me off, the max unit in general as been nerfed everytime someone complains, pls stop. Any player who takes time to play a max needs to be aplauded not ridiculed with the nerf bat, L2P and stop crying everythime a max gets the drop on you, they are very rare occurances due to resourse costing and stupidly long timers.
    • Up x 1
  3. Vonluckner

    As someone that made a character cultivated specifically for playing NC Maxes, today I spent about 60% of my time as dual Hacksaw MAX, average 4:1 KDR in spite, going from BR1 to BR16, with probably 40 certs per hour avg, peaking around 60.:

    It isn't the Hacksaws specifically that are OP, it's that they synergize so absolutely perfectly with the sprint ability, and that the dual Hacksaw MAX is clearly the best infantry unit in the game for camping any sort of chokepoint: spawn exits, teleporter pads, and elevators in tech labs especially. I killed a TR MAX today and only took 2 bars of damage: 14 shots as he falls from the upstairs spawn room, sprint away while reloading, turn back at half way through reload, 14 shots and dead.

    My own performance is heavily, heavily skewed by a couple ridiculous sessions though: an awesome tech lab defence going 40:2, a tech lab assault camping the roof going around 25:1. Camping a quiet spawn exit with 3-4 players in it, solo, during a cap, between 3:1 and 8:1 KDR is a realistic expectation depending on how good the enemy players are. The first kill is always a freebie, I'll tell you that.

    What makes it so much better than the other AI MAXes at the moment, is that the sprint is just vastly more useful to the scattermax than it is for either the TR or Vanu MAX. Both benefit from it, but only the NC MAX can abuse it to completely bully regular infantry by dictating range in its favor. The best way to balance the MAXes would be to give Vanu and TR MAXes base abilities that synergize better with their specific strengths.

    Just to get something out of the way: people saying "all close range AI MAX setups are bad at long range!" probably have zero concept of the actual effective range of the Hacksaws. I would call the effective combat range probably 10m, but preferrably under 5m. Once you get in the 20m range, you are going to be spending 2 or so mags from each gun on a single fresh infantry. It is good at camping doors, and 1v1ing or 2v1ing people in isolated fights, but it has no role beyond that at least with buckshot- I am unlocking extended mags before slugs.

    So to call it overpowered is not entirely accurate. It's unbalanced, but not overpowered. By that I mean that it's extremely good at a very specific role, and colossal waste of time anywhere else. It's relatively easy to counter as another MAX, and can be countered as HA if you're good. Guaranteed it will be controversial and hard to balance.

    As infantry: two HA dumbfire rockets will kill a MAX. If my sprint is down, you have a height advantage (ie: in a window), or I'm bad and have revealed myself at a spawn exit rather than trying to ambush, you should expect to win so long as you don't take unnecessary damage. You will need to be good at videogames- I only met 1-2 HAs today that I would say really just clowned me. A significantly larger number made mistakes and peeked too hard, or missed too many rockets, but still "won" by wearing me down over 2-3 lives without an engi to repair- remember that's a net victory since a MAX loss is infinitely more costly than two, three, or five "free" infantry.

    As MAX: When I sprint, you sprint away. If you sprint any other time, you deserve to lose. I don't expect to win a straight up 1v1 fight at 20m+ with you, period, and you shouldn't expect to win a straight up 1v1 fight at 5m with me, period.
    • Up x 3
  4. Sostratos

    I've never lost a 1v1 fight against a scatmax in my dual Cosmos setup unless I was damaged already. That being said, dual hacksaws should be nerfed anyway because NC tears are ambrosia to me.
  5. Sogui

    If you nerfed the NC max so that it was roughly as strong as the other 2 (with a small advantage at close range), it would still be very strong.

    Once you get 2 AI guns, MAX's are already extremely strong. 100 infantry res is the cost of a block of C4 or 1.25 restoration kits, I can guarantee that AI MAX are already the best base defense tools in the game and the cost is absurdly low. Are you really whining that you would get nerfed from "unstoppable gods" to "demigods of defense"?
  6. Deschain

    Max's arnt unstopable, 90% of the time nobody repairs you, when you die nobody ress's you, any tool with a gun can rip you to peices circle jerking you around obstacles, and no i'm not complaining about anything, except the forum whine to nerf max units everyday.
    • Up x 1
  7. Plunkies

    HELLO? Did no one play beta? Did no one notice when they nerfed scat maxes? The scat max either owns everything at close range, or owns nothing at no range. Those are the only options. Unless you want to give the NC dual cyclers, you have to live with the scat max killing anything that stand within 8 feet of it.
    • Up x 2
  8. Kracken

    This thread is funny. NC has a weapon that hits it target...

    [IMG]




    [IMG]
    • Up x 2
  9. Purple

    yes the NC shotguns do better CqC then the other empires because they have no range and are shot guns. hitting hard is what the NC do.
  10. Maxi'sProteinPowder

    WOW you just dont give up! Dude think of it this way, if you nerfed every single thing that smashed you, how do you think this will effect everyone who has put there own money into this game to get the stufff they want only to be told that there gonna nerf there ****, because someone couldnt work out how to kill them" Dude i could say that this game will die in an instant! I for one will be pissed and then you can own all the little newbies that find out this is a free game. Its guys like you that ruin a game!
  11. Zephirenth

    When you get two AI guns for the MAX, it adequately fills the anti-infantry role for the resource cost, cooldown timer, and other hindrances that hamper MAXes.

    As has been said ad nauseum on this thread, the NC MAX is SUPPOSED to excel at CQC. It uses giant shotguns. You're supposed to stay out of range and kill them from a safe distance, which isn't that far, considering that like normal shotguns, they have a very short effective range. Rockets, grenades and C4 all make great options to taking out an NC MAX, even in biolabs. The point is when you're facing scissors, you're supposed to use rock instead of using paper and expecting it to win.

    Also, unlike C4 and restoration kits, MAXes come with a cooldown timer when you die as one. While you can just keep resupplying C4 and restoration kits after using them or respawning
    • Up x 1
  12. Axler

    Threads like this are the reason I wish NC wasn't the shotgun faction. People are totally okay with the fact that they can own a shotgun user be it MAX or infantry from range, but as soon as they get a face full of buckshot point blank they are all "Shotguns are OP OMG nerf!"

    Whats next complaining that pistols aren't as good as sniper rifles at 100m?
    • Up x 1
  13. snu

    [IMG]

    hey guys, 420 here, and i would just like to let you all know that i didnt get here by using hacksaws...


    I got there using scattercannons


    toodles <3
    • Up x 2
  14. Vonluckner

    MAXes are fine where they are for survivability. There is nothing unstoppable about them. A solo HA can already kill a MAX in many situations.

    Nerfing the damage of the ScatterMAX so that it has a small advantage at close range would make it flat out bad, considering the VS and TR MAXes are still pretty pretty effective beyond the length of a room. You'd have to give the Scatter, Grinder, and Hacksaw better spread and falloff than the Mattock (long range one) to make it even remotely fair.

    Axler has it pretty much spot on regarding complaints about damage. Kill an NC MAX, no contest, at 30-40m? "Working as intended gg no re." Get killed at point blank, no contest? "omg so OP." TR and VS MAXes are underpreforming, but the reason isn't because they can't go toe to toe with a ScatterMAX at 0m.

    Cost is irrelevant as an argument too- it's actually an interesting design decision that they even have a cost considering the limiting factor is the spawn timer, not res (which, as far as I can tell is implimented to limit grenade spam).
  15. muppofmalice

    I haveto say.. The times that I've used Vanu AI max I've cried myself to tears as my hitratio decreased to 10% on anything that wasn't in my immediate vicinity.

    I don't think the NC ScatMAX is overpowered, I think that (atleast) the Vanu AI is UNDERpowered.
  16. Sian

    Dual Quasar is pretty good, but you're giving up a lot to use that. I don't know of anyone that has bought the other AI Vmax guns so I can't say anything on those. I should rent a few sometime and try them out, but looking at the stats, they're all pretty much the same except one's rapid fire, one has more ammo, and one is 'lightweight'
  17. absolofdoom

    I'm curious, are the Vanu AI MAX gun sidegrades "clones" of the TR ones? Or are they completely different? It's pretty obvious where the NC MAX fits in, but I'm not really sure what the VS MAX is like.
  18. DrankTHEKoolaid

    Are the Hacksaws really that much better than the scatterguns? Been using the crap out of the scatterguns and I trialed the hacksaw. Hacksaw just seems like you would waste a lot of shots. Trying to get this all figured out before I dump 1000 certs on the ext magazines.
  19. Cyridius

    Hacksaws **** face in CQC. Coming from an NC player.
    The other MAXes could use a buff.
  20. Vreki

    They are nice, but like everything else in this game you get the moments where even a double load from hacksaws disappear without doing much damage. And then you die.